If you know exactly where to look, you can see Danny Stotler’s old Christmas trees from more than two miles away.
The evergreens are conspicuously inconspicuous, until you know the story of their beginnings.
One by one, the trees were planted as Stotler and his family celebrated Christmas at their family homestead southwest of Iola.
Stotler paid a visit to his old home this week, recalling traditions of Christmases past, including his family’s excursion to nearby pastures in search of the perfect Chrsitmas tree.
When they found one, it was removed, not with an axe, but a shovel.
“We’d dig it up and put it in a pot with dirt and water,” he recalled. “Then we’d decorate the bottom enough that you couldn’t tell it was in a pot.”
And after each Christmas, the trees were replanted on the perimeter of the farmstead, creating an effective windbreak around the small Stotler house, about eight miles southwest of Iola.
That was nearly 60 years ago.
“I figure I was 7 or 8 when we started doing that,” said Stotler, now 65. “It’s funny to think that some of these probably weren’t more than 3½ feet tall when we planted them.”
Through the years — and even after Stotler moved away — the tradition continued. He figures more than 20 evergreens were planted in all, including some for celebrations — like when his children were born — or sometimes on somber occasions, such as the death of his mother and other relatives.
All but one have survived.
This summer’s heat proved too harsh for the evergreen that was planted 10 years ago when his mother, Beulah, died.
“I hated losing that one,” he said. “The ground just got too dry. I tried watering it, but it just wouldn’t make it.”
The trees tower above neighboring trees and structures, to the point that Stotler wonders if they’re too tall.
“I’m sure when the right storm comes along, it might do some damage to them,” he said.
The trees, plus a nearby row of hay bales serve as an effective barrier to snow drifts, allowing Stotler access to a nearby pasture, where he feeds his cattle.
He plans to take a chainsaw to the tree line in the near future to clear out the thick undergrowth, populated by dozens of smaller trees as well.
STOTLER was the fourth and final generation of his family to live on the farmstead, near the intersection of 200 Street and Missouri Road, just east of the Allen-Woodson county line.
